Wings
by SirienneHolmes
Summary: Sequel to "Recovery." It's John's turn to heal. What will happen? Johnlock PLEASE REVIEW I love to hear from you! Thanks! It's been updated slightly with more awesomeness!


****_5/31/12: UPDATED! ^-^_

**Wings**

(Sequel to "Recovery")

"No, John," I pushed away the eggs my love was trying to feed me and sipped my tea instead.

"Sherlock, I know you want them. You haven't been back seven days," John pointed out.

Boy, did the man know his patient. It's true. It was December 22, I think, very close to Christmas, in fact dangerously so. I hadn't been back a full week yet, and I _did_ want those eggs. I was still so horribly malnourished.

But… "I've healed enough, John," I said softly, tenderly, almost begging. "Tell me." I set my tea aside and leaned forward in the chair. "Tell me _everything_."

John, standing, was a long time just staring at me, his eyes flicking over my lean frame. I'd had Mycroft send a suitcase of "temporary" clothes, the clothes I had worn abroad, made for a man of thinner stature: Me. The way I was now. I didn't have the suit jacket on, which was much the same with buttons moved for a tighter fit, but the black shirt with faint shiny stripes in white and light grey in it and the jeans (the skinny jeans, in black, too) were two sizes smaller than my regular clothes, and though they were getting snug when I breathed, recovery was a long way off. And even though it usually crippled my ego when I gained even half a pound, I wasn't bothered by gaining this weight back. The words "high metabolism" flickered in my mind.

But this wasn't only about me. "I'm not the only one who suffered, John," I reasoned very softly, touching the calloused hand of my war-hardened flatmate. "In fact, I didn't suffer at all."

John, wearing a red shirt untucked (a welcome change from the jumpers) and brown corduroy pants, hissed through his teeth and began to protest, but before he could, I rose swiftly and kissed him on the mouth and then sat back down again, my hands steepled. My smirk finally broke the doctor down, and he sat.

"Life without you…" he began in a small voice, "…was so bleak. I—I could barely get up in the morning, I couldn't think, eating became a habit. I didn't _enjoy_ anything. Not sunshine or dogs or children or my job." He put his face into his hands and rubbed at his eyes.

I sat back with the nauseating thought of John, all alone in the desolate, cold flat with no one there to keep him company fresh in my mind. Sadness crushed against my chest, and I felt I would implode with emotion. John looked up and I nodded, urging him to continue, to heal, even if every word hurt me.

"I _never_, not once, doubted you," John had some pride in his voice now, and I smiled sadly. "But, I did what you told me to do. It was all over the papers…" His voice became small again and he retreated into his hands, falling into his chair and curling up like a little hedgehog in hibernation. The sadness in my chest was shaking me now, rocking my body. My breathing tripped over itself and a noise that wasn't quiet escaped painfully from my throat. The sobs were beginning again. But I fought to listen. I _needed_ John to heal, too. "_Goddamn it_, Sherlock!" John yelled and as his face exploded away from his hands and his body uncurled aggressively, I saw tears streaming down his face, and that was all it took for me to start crying, too, though I held back, yes I did, because John needed this.

The last thing Sherlock Holmes needed to do was cry.

"You're a fucking angel!" John yelled. "Yes you are! I could see wings as you fell, Sherlock! _God. Damn. __**Wings**_! And when I saw you there on the pavement—well, maybe it wasn't you and goddamn it Sherlock I could care less—some part of me just keeled over and _died_! And do you know what?" He stood angrily, murderous, leaning over me, and I forced myself to look up, my entire body shaking uncontrollably, my breath coming in short gasps because I was crying. Crying bitterly like I would never again admit to doing. "It smelled like rotting human _life_, Sherlock! Like the damn body parts you—and it was so weird not _seeing_ them! And your grave—I felt you watching me, with me, always! _Sherlock_!"

John was done being angry, but I was not done crying. I dove into the arm of the plush chair and half curled up like a toddler and sobbed. I sobbed loudly, but I muffled my mouth with the chair until all I could taste was the stuff that had been absorbed into it—smoke and sweat and cocaine and tea—and just let myself cry. Because I could _feel_ John's loneliness like it was my own, and I shouldered it and took it with me as a reminder that I must _never_ leave again, ever, without giving some sign that I am alive. John sits in the chair and lets me cry, and I know that he is crying, too.

After I've cried myself hoarse, I crawl into his lap and sit there across his knees though I am much taller, and bend myself so I can lay my head against his shoulder. John winces at my bones, but makes no effort to accept or reject me. "I'm sorry," I whisper in a voice hoarse from tears and shaky with sobs. "I'm so very, very sorry, John, and I've never felt more like a _freak_ in my life, to just leave you! I'm sorry, sorry, sorry!" Tears come fresh, burning my dry eyes, and I close them, weary. I have called myself a freak for John, a name I hate, a name that would break my heart if I heard it pass his lips in anything but jest.

John eventually sticks his nose into my hair and inhales deeply. Then, he slides his hand up my back and rests his thick, muscular fingers between my curls, holding my skull hostage there against him. For a brief moment, I am afraid he will crush it, that I will die, and I realize that I would be okay with that.

I would be okay with John Watson doing a lot of masochistic things to me. I would let him beat me up, cut me open, starve me, tie me up, whip me, scratch me, lock me in a dark closet, kill me. The only thing I can't let him do is break my heart.

Because I _need_ him. Like I have never needed anyone before.

I get up from his lap suddenly, and I am looking down at John in my clothes that had to be bought tight to fit my starving frame and John is looking up at me, robust and healthy if not teary. We stare at each other for a long time. Then, I unbutton my shirt and take it off and lay it on the chair. I then stand like the figure of Jesus on Catholic crosses, my arms outstretched, my feet close together, my head bowed. I stand there, my arms admittedly trembling from the strain, submissive, begging, starving, cold. "I want you to hurt me," I look at John with tears in my eyes, the water droplets catching in my obscenely long eyelashes. As I breathe, I can feel my skin contract taut against my ribs, know John can see them. John only looks amused as I speak. "I want you to hurt me as much as you can. For as long as you can. For however much and however long you think it's necessary."

"Why?" There is a laugh in John's voice. He obviously thinks I'm being absurd.

In response, I snap at him petulantly. I want him to take me seriously. "To make your _pain_ go away, John! To _heal_! Do all you must to me! I won't resist!" I'm shouting now, sobbing again unconsciously. "Do _anything_, please, but don't break my _heart_, John!" My massive brain may be turned off because I'm spouting random and insane-sounding things, but I mean every word. I'm panting, my arms dropping to my sides. I haven't eaten anything today, and the few sips of tea in my stomach do nothing. I feel the world begin to go hazy, and force myself to stand up straight, to be on guard, to be ready to be hurt.

John's arms wrap around my ribs, which is good, because John is warm and full of breakfast (I watched him eat every bite on his plate) and John is the only man I love, perhaps the only _person_ I have ever loved, and he is the only person I _will_ ever love with 100% of me, Sherlock Holmes. John sighs, his breath warm on my chest. It tickles, but I stand still, knowing John could strike, could hit, could kill. And Sherlock would be no more. I tense, waiting for the hit. John pulls back and I close my eyes…

And rough fingers are tracing the outline of my face, slowly passing over each eyelid and down along my nose and around my pale lips. They end up in my hair, and John breathes against my collarbone, "I don't _want_ to hurt you, Sherlock."

I hug him back, hold John against me, because I'm very afraid he will turn to dust and nuzzle my face in his spiky, rough hair, which I adore. They really _are_ like a hedgehog's prickles.

"I don't want to hurt you," John says again, forcefully, a soldier in command of a young, scared novice, and I can see him on the battlefield, calmly ordering a young soldier to do as he must. "I love you, Sherlock! And yes, I hurt because you were gone. You say you didn't suffer, but I'm going to bet you had no easy time on your own. If your weight is any indication." I give a low, muted chuckle before he kisses my collarbone again, his lips warm and moist because he's just licked them. I sigh, then, and move towards his warmth, the warmth I have been missing in my life, and he presses his lips there again and gives a lick. I moan and hug John tighter.

"Mine," I declare, looking at him with bright eyes.

"Yours," John kisses my lips, his mouth upturning into a smile as we part. And there is the face of my soldier and I bend down to touch his forehead to mine just as he stretches up. I can taste the faint remains of toast and eggs and salt especially and I wet my lips.

But John is speaking. And for once, I don't hesitate to listen. "Sherlock, I don't care what you or anyone else says. You are an angel." His hands slide up to touch my protruding scapula and I groan, putting my face into sandy hair because my back hurts almost more than any other place on my body, my malnourished, aching stomach taking the number one spot. "They hurt, don't they?" John asks me so tenderly that I nod, not sure where this is going. "Why, Sherlock," he purrs in a low and loving voice, "that is where Moriarty ripped off your wings so you couldn't fly."

"But I came back," I reply, smiling faintly.

"Yes you did," John continues to rub my back. "A phoenix from the flames."

_Please review! I might do a few more of these!_


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